Posts Tagged ‘Guns’

I know there is a great deal of sensitivity about guys and schools but have US school administrators completely lost their minds? How does a 5-year-old with a mild, natural interest in guns constitute a suicide risk?

One mother is furious after her 5-year-old daughter was reportedly forced to sign a “suicide contract” at school.

Rebecca said that while she was in the lobby waiting to pick up her child, “they had my 5-year-old sign a contract about suicide and homicide … There should be a different way to handle this situation. If this is protocol it needs to be looked at again.” Rebecca added that she did not think her daughter knew what the words in the contract even meant.

“I think if we had stepped back and looked at the situation and that others could have been involved — if the principal had known about it — we could have probably had some additional guidance,” Peek told the outlet.

Peek told The Huffington Post that she has not been in touch with the mother since hearing about the incident, but she intends to meet with her and “reassure mom that everything is fine and her child is going to be well taken care of.”

Teachers were never designed to be gunslingers. We are not meant for guns, meter rules yes, throwing blackboard dusters maybe, but not real guns. In the short time some schools have allowed their teachers to carry firearms we have heard of a few occasions when they have been put to use. Not on school shooters but accidentally whilst one teacher was on the toilet and another was doing some filing or something of that nature:

Why would a teacher feel the need to bring a gun to school? This afternoon the Technology Center of

Dupage sent out an automated recorded call that said an instructor at the school had “accidently” discharged a firearm during class today. The call said that the instructor was a retired FBI agent and that the bullet had traveled through a filing cabinet and wall before stopping.

As the parent of a child who attends TCD, I found this to be horrifying. Retired FBI or not, why would a teacher feel the need to bring a gun into a classroom full of high school kids? And not just a gun, but a loaded gun, at that. This is the type of phone call that makes your heart stop. Although my child is safe, you can’t help but keep thinking, “What if?”

The call did explain that guns are not allowed on the campus and it looks like the incident was an accident, but I just don’t understand what was going through this teacher’s head when he decided to bring a loaded weapon into a classroom. I really feel bad for the kids who were in the teachers class, I can only imagine how they must feel being inches away from something tragically bad happening to them.

I just can’t stop shaking my head at the actions of this teacher. Thankfully no one is hurt, but this could have easily been much, much worse.

Like this:

Another tragic death from a needless school shooting. And what is the response? Further security protocols. The call to arm teachers.

Why is it that countries always borrow from other countries when it comes to mimicking academic achievement, but not when it comes to other crucial aspects of school life? I hear a lot about implementing the Finish model of education to try and garner similar results. But what about copying from a country that has had very few violent related school incidents?

Take Australia for instance. Since Australia implemented its strict gun laws which involved a tax payer funded gun buy-back scheme, we have seen no gun violence in our schools that I am aware of.

Of course change is much harder for the US because of gun rights in its constitution.

But how many school deaths do we tolerate before we make a change that is crying out to be made. They say guns don’t kill people, people do.

The “My First Rifle” concept is absolutely abhorrent! Gifting a rifle to a 5-year-old achieves no discernible purpose whatsoever. The result of such negligence can certainly lead to tragedy:

A 2-year-old girl was accidentally shot and killed by her 5-year-old brother while he was playing with a child-size rifle given to him as a gift, authorities in Kentucky say.

Caroline Starks, a blonde, blue-eyed girl, was fatally shot in the chest by her brother’s .22-caliber rifle only minutes after her mother says she stepped outside their home in Burkesville on Tuesday.

The single-shot weapon fired is a rifle specifically marketed to children as ‘My First Rifle’ by company Keystone Sporting Arms, according to authorities.

It was given to the 5-year-old as a gift last year, Cumberland County Coroner Gary White told the Lexington Herald-Leader.‘It’s a Crickett,’ White identified the weapon used. ‘It’s a little rifle for a kid. …The little boy’s used to shooting the little gun.’‘Accidents happen with guns,’ he continued. ‘They thought the gun was actually unloaded, and it wasn’t.’‘It was god’s will. It was her time to go, I guess,’ Caroline’s grandmother, Linda Riddle, told Lex18 on Wednesday.

‘I just know she’s in heaven right now and I know she’s in good hands with the lord,’ Riddle said.

The company, Keystone Sporting Arms, produced 60,000 Crickett and Chipmunk rifles in 2008, according to its website.It also makes guns for adults, but most of its products are geared toward children. The smaller guns come in all sorts of colors, including blue and pink.

The company’s slogan is ‘my first rifle’ and its website has a ‘Kids Corner’ section where pictures of young boys and girls are displayed, most of them showing the children at shooting ranges and on bird and deer hunts. The smaller rifles are sold with a mount to use at a shooting range.

The shooting highlights a cultural divide in the gun debate. While many suburban and urban areas work to keep guns out of the hands of children, it’s not uncommon for youths in rural areas to own guns for target practice and hunting.

I have long said that there is rampant extremism in our educational system. Educational thinking lacks balance and is certainly devoid of common sense. Too often good intentions become crazy ideas because they are taken too far.

To read that the New South Wales Education Department would even consider for a brief moment a proposal to bring target shooting into schools just made me shake my head in disbelief. Of all the stupid, irresponsible, insane ideas (and there’s too many of them to count), this one surely takes the cake:

High school students could be allowed to shoot guns during school hours under a plan by the NSW Education Department.

An internal department submission has revealed an advanced plan to allow target shooting into extra-curricular programs at the state’s 650 high schools, The Daily Telegraph reported on Tuesday.

It comes after the department consulted the NSW Shooters and Fishers Party and shooters associations about how to roll out target shooting into schools.

Deputy director-general schools Gregory Prior said the department was yet to make a decision about the issue.

Readers in the US might not flinch at such a program, but we in Australia do not have the right to bear arms in our constitution. As a matter of fact, being in possession of a firearm is illegal. Why on earth would we want to encourage in any way, shape or form the use of guns?

Sure it would engage disillusioned students. It would be an absolute hit, I have no doubt about that. But what kind of message would you be sendin? Ask the kind folks of Columbine whether they think this initiative has merit.

Why can’t they think of responsible and productive ways to engage students? Why does educational thinking continue to lean towards the radical instead of the sensible?

Shame on you! Why would you ever consider allowing people to legally carry guns on school grounds? How does proposing a bill that allows gun owners with a legal permit to enter school grounds with a gun, worthy of your time, energy or consideration? Why would gun owners need to carry a gun with them to pick up their kids anyway?

Parents and teachers with concealed handgun permits could legally bring their guns to school under a bill that Cleveland County lawmakers supported in the state House last week.

A measure to loosen gun restrictions in the Tar Heel State would allow concealed carry permit-holders to have their handguns on school grounds if the firearms are kept inside a closed compartment or container within a locked car. Reps. Tim Moore, Kelly Hastings and Mike Hager voted for the bill, which won approval in the House June 7 and is slated for committee hearings in the state Senate.

“If you’re going to pick your child up at school and you’re otherwise a law-abiding citizen and have no criminal intent, you should not be charged as a felon just because you’re exercising your Second Amendment right,” said Hastings, a primary sponsor of House Bill 650.

Supporters stress that those with concealed-carry permits meet stringent safety requirements and pass criminal background checks, but educators fear that allowing handguns on school property would increase the likelihood of violent crime.

“I have concerns both as a superintendent and as a parent,” said Cleveland County Schools Superintendent Dr. Bruce Boyles. “I understand the right to have firearms, but I also understand the potential for them to become a problem on the school campus.

”‘Not like the wild west’

Hastings said allowing adults with valid concealed handgun permits to keep their guns locked securely in the car when they drop off and pick up their children wouldn’t affect school safety. Anyone who can’t legally carry concealed or who intends to commit a crime would still face severe punishment.

“The very few people this will apply to have had to meet a very high burden to be able to carry a firearm,” he said. “It’s not like the wild west. There are still a lot of restrictions in place.”

Parents’ passion for both their children’s education and their participation in sports and activities can sometimes make tempers run hot, Boyles said. Adding guns to that volatile mix, he fears, could put parents, educators and children at greater risk.

“We have parents who come on campus from time to time who are unhappy with one of our decisions or something that’s happened between their child and another child,” he said. “It’s troubling to think about the potential for a change that would allow weapons to be on our campuses.”

With all the problems facing the world today, surely they could have pushed this brainless idea to the side.

I appreciate the kindness of parents and students when they write me a short note or give me a gift at the end of the year. It makes me feel appreciated. However, if any parent or student is thinking about giving me a loaded gun as a gift, I would beg them to please abstain. Such gifts I don’t need.

An elementary school teacher in Florida was shocked when she received a loaded gun as an end of the school year present, which turns out was unknowingly packed with the real gift.

A memo from the school principal at Allamanda Elementary explained that a teacher opened a gift at home she found a small handgun at the bottom of the box.

“Where’s the parents at? Where’s the parents of this child? I mean, how did he obtain this gun?” asked parent Jarrett Goddard.

School officials dispersed the news quickly.

A spokesperson for the Palm Beach County School District said in a statement that school police are investigating a report that a student at the school may have given a teacher a gift in a box that also contained a small handgun.

It also said that no one was injured and the investigation is continuing, and no further information is available at this time.

Officials said the student’s grandmother packed the present but didn’t know there was a gun inside the box.

It’s unclear how the gun got there, but it was never in the student’s hands.

What happened to the good old apple? It’s nutritious and you can’t shoot anything with it.

Sen. Christensen explains his proposal: “I think it’s a local decision, but I think it’s important if you think about a situation that opens up where someone gets shot, that particular individual can continue shooting until police arrive. Or, you could have a security guard armed or administration—whatever you would choose to do locally to defend the situation. It would probably take care of it quickly,” he said.

The notion that the higher the proportion of people carrying guns the lower the rate of shootings is false and utterly preposterous. Teachers in certain schools face shamefully bad conditions. School shootings do occur and should never be underplayed. But arming the caregiver, is the worst possible response to the problem.

Schools have to deal with the issue through constructive strategies and the safety of teachers must be considered at all times. But teachers are there to model positive behaviour and good decisions. They must be there for their students. A teacher that carries around a gun is distancing himself from all his students. The gun becomes a representation of an “us vs them” mentality which regardless of the teacher’s school or environment, does not belong in our great profession.

Meanwhile, Christensen is convinced he’s on to a winner:

Christensen doesn’t think giving people guns can become a problem.

“I’ve never seen a gun escalate a situation,” said Christensen, “Guns don’t kill people, people do. You’ve gotta have an individual that’s out of control and at that point in time, you can have someone be shot.”

Here’s my advice for any teacher hoping to one day bring a concealed weapon into their classroom. Find another profession … quickly!